News

The mountain gorilla is one of the most endangered species of wildlife on Earth. Keeping track of them is the specialty of Dr. Annette Lanjouw, considered one of the world's leading authorities on mountain gorillas.

Recently Dr. Lanjouw visited the United States to share her concerns about saving the animals that are the focus of her life. During a visit to the Hill School in Middleburg, Virginia, Voice of America Television was there to witness the lecture.

The Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) and its counterparts in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, have petitioned Interpol to investigate and arrest suspects engaged in poaching of the highly endangered mountain gorillas.

In the last 6 months, there have been at least four poaching attacks on groups of mountain gorillas in the two forests that harbor the last remaining members of this endangered subspecies (Gorilla beringei beringei).

They can run down antelopes under 100 pounds. Large packs have been known to take zebras and even elands. But African wild dogs are a globally endangered species.

Now the Walt Disney Company Foundation and the Disney Wildlife Conservation Fund are supporting an African Wildlife Foundation study that will lead to a better understanding of a "remnant" wild dog population in southern Kenya and northern Tanzania - and will help promote coexistence with local Maasai pastoral communities.

Nations and conservationists must step up their vigilance against illegal ivory sales and the poaching of elephants in the wake of the Nov. 15 decision by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to allow one-time ivory sales by Botswana, Namibia and South Africa, the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF) said today.